Best way to deal with a beaten England?

[DABegley]

I am playing Scotland in Divine Right 5.2, no lucky nations, standard difficulty, and it is 1416. I built up cash, allied with France and waited for my opportunity to pounce on England. France of course wouldn't start a war with England being totally peaceful and annexing vassals. I was getting pretty cranky until I noticed England's border guard next to Lothian had left. Checking England I found out she was at war with Burgundy, Brabant and a whole host of low countries. In addition she only had 9,000 total troops, that was the border guard so all her other troops had been destroyed by Burgundy. I had 7,000 troops and a good amount of cash. I bought 5,000 mercs, started full minting and declared war with no CB. The stab hit and infamy cost was worth it. I called France who joined but didn't even invade any English mainland provinces. Portugal joined England and a few minors joined in as well but they couldn't reach me. I swatted the remaining English troops but was in trouble when 12,000 Portuguese showed up joining with the remaining English. I never realized how many events Scotland gets. "Scottish Resistance" and "Resist the English" fired off, joined the existing "Highland Charge". Then two rounds of "The Highlanders Show up" happened and it was all over. The Portuguese and English were annihilated. A year or so of mopping up newly built English troops and sieging provinces has left me with only a couple provinces more to take on Great Britain and the question of the best way to end the war.

I have no CB so it is 4 infamy per province. Is it better to grab as many provinces as possible and live with the infamy for a decade or so or would it be better to make England release as many states as possible then attack again in 10 years, or something in between? Thanks.

 

[Nessaj]

If you wait a while then you might get some defecting provinces for 1 infamy a pop. IIRC this only triggers for provinces that isn't part of their culture so at best you're going to get Wales, Cornwall and maybe some parts of northern England. After that just take the infamy hits until they're small enough to vassalize after a few years of occupation.

 

[unmerged(540854)]

Home culture provinces can't defect so only wales and cornwall. At the start of the game I would not wait for that, you could have waited 10 years and annexed the next swat of provinces before any defect. It's more valid against global spanning empires.

But in any case it depends on the type of game you wanna play and if England is still a threat. If you think you can not yet beat em handsdown in the next war, make em release some nations, if you think you can. Take as much land as you can infamy wise, preferably cutting them in half.

 

[unmerged(20077)]

Make them release Wales, too.

 

[DABegley]

Are the northern provinces the same culture or just in the same group? I have had provinces from the same group defect before just not the exact same culture. I'm feeling impatient though and don't want to wait. I'll probably make them release Wales and take as many provinces as possible. The benefit of being on an island is that it is tough for people to get at you even if they declare war. I don't know how many provinces I can take but I doubt more than 4 or 5, even if I don't make them release Wales, which will only gain me 20 or less infamy. I can live with that. I think I will try and sneak a few regiments onto Ireland to take the one province there first though. I have to track down the English fleet and make sure I can get there before they sink me. One of the Irish minors should give me access to run and hide in. Thanks.

 

[Nessaj]

Are the northern provinces the same culture or just in the same group? I have had provinces from the same group defect before just not the exact same culture. I'm feeling impatient though and don't want to wait. I'll probably make them release Wales and take as many provinces as possible. The benefit of being on an island is that it is tough for people to get at you even if they declare war. I don't know how many provinces I can take but I doubt more than 4 or 5, even if I don't make them release Wales, which will only gain me 20 or less infamy. I can live with that. I think I will try and sneak a few regiments onto Ireland to take the one province there first though. I have to track down the English fleet and make sure I can get there before they sink me. One of the Irish minors should give me access to run and hide in. Thanks.

Don't take my word for this but I think they're another culture, just in the same group which should enable defection. I've had Castillian provinces defect to me - those were in the northern part, which I assume has a different culture despite the Kingdom of Leon tag not being in the game.

 

[DABegley]

I went with the "take all you can" strategy. 5 provinces the first war, 4 provinces and release Wales the second war and 4 provinces the third war. England is down to the 3 channel provinces and London. My big issue has been infamy. In 50 years of war/truce I have never had a CB so I had to declare war without one and eat the 2 point infamy cost and 4 infamy per province annexed. I was at 26 at the highest point after the second war and at -.6 per year it takes forever to reduce it and my trade was devastated while it was that high along with rebellions everywhere. I just think it is ridiculous that Scotland never had a CB on England for 50 years.

 

[unmerged(540854)]

well england will normally declare on you for reconquest the 2th time and sometimes the third. That should have been 3 a peace. The first one you can try to get in an ally casus belli. Just find out whoever england is in a war with and try to ally them.

Hight martial king can get you the conquest casus belli high diplo can get you boundary disputes and ones they are small you might get a vasslize casus belli. Intentionally going orthodox and then picking unam sanctum works aswell but is a bit hard to pull off as scotland, losing to novo and then hoping they force conversion? Not likely